In article <9b4e2ee0.0402042305.592e75a8@posting.google.com>,
flee wrote:
>Any one knows why citizensihp is having major jams?
>
>Applied: May 2003
>Finger print: Nov 2003
I'd say that this "jam" is not really major, not from the point of
view of official service standards:
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/times/cit-processing.html
As you see, CIC nowadays tells you that as long as it takes no more
than 10 month from the application to the test, or 12 month from
the application to the oath, it is within their standards.
Based on a dozen or so data points (my friends' or newsgroup posters'
experiences) more typical times are (or were in 2000-2003) "4+4" or
"4+4+4". That is, if you're lucky enough not to be asked for
fingerprints, you can get your test, on average, as soon as 4 months
after application, and the oath another 4 month later. If they want
fingerprints, it puts another 4 month into the process, between the
application and test. Of course these times are only very
non-scientific, anecdotal averages, with a standard deviation of at
least about 2 month for each of the component. So I'd say that if you
sent them your fingerprints in November, there are good chance to have
an exam by March, give or take a month or two. So you should make sure
that you check your mailbox often -- and, if possible, are accessible
at your telephone number too, in case CIC wants to offer you a chance
to take an exam on short notice.
Now, why the standards are what they are, I can't say. I mean, CIC,
RCMP, and CSIS process some 150,000-200,000 citizenship applications a
year; it is a big-time operation with literally hundreds of officers
working on them, and a $30 million annual budget. You'd think that the
government could rationalize the process a bit: perhaps, "parallelize"
it to allow the applicant to take the test at a time and location of
his choice (sort of like driver's license exam, or IELTS/TEF for visa
applicants) while immigration and security checks are running;
perhaps, hire a few more citizenship officers, citizenship judges, and
security check people funded by a modest increase in the application
fee. But this is not a very high-priority thing for anybody in the
government, as it seems. It's not like citizenship applicants can
vote, after all. CIC mentions somewhere that they contracted for a new
computer system for case managenment, but it remains to be seen when
it comes and how useful it will be.
The Liberal Governments have tried for ages (well a decade at least)
to clarify citizenship requirements by defining "residence" as
"physical presence". This would allow to remove discretion from
citizenship judges, and thus remove judges themselves from the
decision-making process. But all these attempts were ill-fated: every
time such a bill was introduced, Parliament was prorogued before the
new Citizenship Act had a chance to be enacted. (I would say that the
government should have used the American way, and instead of
re-writing the whole bill at once, just amended the one relevant
section; but who am I am to give them advice?)
In the great scheme of things, our citizenship process is not the
smoothest in the world, but far from the most complicated either. On
the one end of the spectrum, Australia apparently has fairly
starightforward system that allows processing of applications within
just a few weeks. But of course not only is Australian legislation
more straightforward than Canadian (they explicitly require 2 years of
physical presence as a prerequisite for citizenship), but moreover,
Australia, unlike Canada, is an island, and its government has a
computer system that allows it to verify anybody's arrival and
departures dates. On the other hand, in the USA a year's waiting for
naturalization is nothing unusual (and you need 5 years -- actually, 4
years 9 month is OK -- of permanent residence before you can apply).
And if you were to naturalize in a country like Switzerland, in some
cantons they would put your name on ballot, for a public referendum,
so that your naturalization would be actually approved by the
population of your community! How about that? :-)
--vladimir
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